British North America [pp. 156-166]

BRITISH NORTH AMERICA.
veins rich with the- purest of gold. The yield of the various
mines for the twelve months ending Sept. 30th, 1866, was nearly
$500,000 (gold.) The Londonderry Iron Mines produce a quantity of metal greatly esteemed in England for manufacturing
fine cutlery-knives, razors and scissors. The grindstones for
sharpening such cutlery are 41so furnished by Nova Scotia. She
has slates, granite, and many kinds of freestone in great abundance. Nova Scotia freestone is now largely used for building
purposes in, many of our Northern cities. Plaster and lime rock
have l6ng been exported to this country in large quantities.
Qlay for brick and pottery is abundant, and material for finer
ware is said to abound. Coal, copper, lead, manganese and
marble, are also found in this famed land, where natural resources are as yet but very imperfectly ascertained. The people on
the Atlantic coast are principally maintained in fisheries; and
trimmer schooners or a finer race of seamen, than those which
sail firom Nova Scotia ports, it would be impossible to find.
Ship-building is another great bianch of Nova Scotian industry.
If we leave the Atlantic shore, and journey inland, we find a
soil unequalled for fertility. Marsh land, reclaimed from the
sea by dykes, where grass grows (and has grown for over one
hundred years,) without the aid of manure, higher than the head
of the tallest man; rich fields of luxuriant clover; and two of
the finest valleys the sun shines on-one devoted almost exclusively to potatoe culture, and the other to fruits. This section
is known as the "Garden of Nova Scotia," and embraces the
site of the ancient village of Grand Pr6, the scene of "Evangeline." Crossing the treacherous Bay of Fundy, we come to the
Province of New Brunswick; which is largely engaged in shipbuilding, lumbering, fishing, agriculture and manufacture. She
has vast forests of timber, fine farming land, valuable coal mines,
and is foremost among the maritime Provinces in manufacturing.
Nova Scotia, however, is determined to be the great workshop
of the new Confederacy. Canada is better known to the people
of this country than her sister Provinces. Her agricultural
resources are immense. She is to be the great granary of British
North America. Her present condition is highly flourishing and
prosperous. Montreal, the great metropolis, is growing with
wonderful rapidity, and is now one of the finest cities on this
continent. Canada has valuable fabrics, immense forts, and an
abundance of iron and copper ore. Such is a brief sketch of
the Provinces which now prepare to unite under one central
government.
A "Year Book" of British North America has just been published at Montreal, of which the Halifax (N. S.) Republic furnishes
a comprehensive and interesting summary. The number of residents in British America in January, 1867, which may be taken
as the starting-point for the proposed Confederatior, will be
about four millions. Were the same increase to continue until
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